Disruptive ProactivityFirst thoughts on a new macbook pro with touchbar.
My 6 year old macbookpro died a death with (minimal) notice this morning. I had a backup, but it was a clear hardware failure that was going to take time to repair.
So, instituting “oh fuck procedure 2″, I took a trip to the Apple Store and asked what they had in stock. 10 minutes later, I walked out with a 13” MBP with touchbar, a usb-A adapter, a USB-C iphone cable.
It took about 5 hours from walking into the apple store with my credit card, to sitting at home with a working laptop having restored from a time machine backup (which took about 3 and a half hours) happy that everything that had been backed up had been restored
These are my first thoughts on the new hardware.
1) Having 4 USB ports is ridiculously useful.
Right now, I have all 4 in use, all doing things.
They are ridiculously helpful being able to use both sides of the laptop interchangably.
2) The retina screen is adorable.
3) They Keyboard is taking a little bit of getting used to, but is pretty good
4) I can see that the touchbar will be really amazing when people finish figuring out how to use it for stuff. When it’s doing things, it’s so very helpful.
5) a USB-C only world is actually better for what it is, even if the transition is a bit of a pain.
Given the emergency nature of the change, it was not planned for. I’d thought about whether I wanted a new macbook, but had deferred a decision until the new year and customised availability was better.
Something else happened instead.
{This was written on Wednesday, and then work got in the way before posting. It turns out my laptop and monitor were both destroyed by a power spike which got past a failed surge protector.}